Gloucester Cathedral flower arranger who said no to vetting is forced to resign

Annabel Hayter is an unlikely rebel. She’s 64 years old and for more than 40 of those has helped out with arranging flowers in church.

But, like so many of those volunteering their time and skills to charities and community activities, she was insulted by demands for criminal record checks.

Now she has paid the price for rebelling against the vetting procedure.

Stalwart: Annabel Hayter has been flower arranging for 40 years

Officials from Gloucester Cathedral, which she has been helping to fill with colour for 15 years, have forced her to quit as chairman of its Flower Guild.

Mrs Hayter, whose defiant stand was highlighted by the Daily Mail last month, said last night: ‘I’m not really sure I had a choice, they wanted me out. They told me: “We are looking for your resignation”.’

Already five of her 60 fellow flower arrangers have resigned in protest at the treatment of Mrs Hayter.

She has been leading a dignified mini-rebellion against demands for criminal record checks on Guild members.

One reason the cathedral gave for the checks was that the women shared a toilet with choirboys and there was a risk of paedophiles infiltrating the flower guild – average age about 70.

Mrs Hayter said: ‘It is insulting. They are all lovely, lovely ladies who would not hurt a fly. They are not paedophiles. When I can rise above the sadness of it all it is laughable, pathetic.

Officials from Gloucester Cathedral, which Mrs Hayter has been helping to fill with colour for 15 years, have forced her to quit as chairman of its Flower Guild

‘I did the church flowers for 27 years in the previous parish where we lived and so this will be the first Christmas in over 40 years where I have not done the flowers. It does hurt.’

Mrs Hayter, former head of an interior design company, was one of 60 fellow flower arrangers told earlier this year they would have to have a Criminal Records Bureau check.

Gloucester Cathedral had demanded that every volunteer should undergo checks for convictions and cautions, including ‘welcomers’ who greet tourists, and guides, who are no longer allowed to accompany visitors into the crypt except in pairs.

From the Mail, November 26, 2010

Last Friday two members of the cathedral’s ruling body, the Chapter,
visited mother of four and grandmother of 11 Mrs Hayter at home.

She says they told her she had ‘usurped’ their trust by using Flower
Guild notepaper for a letter highlighting her campaign.

Mrs Hayter
said: ‘It was quite a fighting letter asking people to stand shoulder
to shoulder but there are people within the cathedral who are writing
their own rules here.’

The Chapter of Gloucester Cathedral said it has ‘accepted the resignation of Mrs Annabel Hayter’ and is ‘conscious of the enormous commitment, generosity and creativity Mrs Hayter has brought to the role’.

It added: ‘The Chapter fully appreciates that there are those who are not in sympathy with its policy on CRB checks for volunteers.

‘However, Mrs Hayter took a prominent role in campaigning publicly against the Chapter’s current policy and, in a letter to Flower Guild members sent on November 29, encouraged other volunteers to refuse to comply with future CRB checks.

'Mrs Hayter has accepted that her campaigning activities are incompatible with her role as chairman of the Guild.’

The Manifesto Club which campaigns against the regulation of everyday life and has been supporting the flower arrangers’ stand, said: ‘Even by the standards of today’s over-cautious guidance, there is absolutely no justification for vetting these 60 flower arrangers.

‘They have no contact with children as part of their work. They are mainly retired ladies who are embedded in the church community.

‘It is the Chapter that has betrayed the trust of the guild, by asking them to undergo these suspicious procedures – not its chairman.’

The Manifesto Club last summer revealed that charities and voluntary groups have spent £350million carrying out criminal record checks on helpers. The money went on fees, form-filling and staff time.

CRB checks on those who may come into contact with children began in earnest after the Soham murder of two children by school caretaker Ian Huntley.

The system was developed by Labour into the Vetting and Barring Scheme designed to register 11million individuals, from school crossing patrolmen to plumbers and electricians working in schools.

Following protests, the Home Office announced it was seeking to limit the scope of the scheme by working on the principle that people are safe to work with children unless there is clear evidence that this is not the case.

Sports clubs, Scouts and Guides and NHS Boards have all lost helpers who refused the checks in protest at having their private lives examined, and because of the form-filling and costs involved.

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Gloucester Cathedral flower arranger who said no to vetting is forced to resign